


Counting Stars

by ChrissyStriped



Series: Counting Stars [17]
Category: TOLKIEN J. R. R. - Works & Related Fandoms, The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Aman (Tolkien), Boys Kissing, Cuddling & Snuggling, Fourth Age, M/M, Storytelling
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-14
Updated: 2019-08-14
Packaged: 2020-08-23 22:34:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,352
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20246557
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ChrissyStriped/pseuds/ChrissyStriped
Summary: Melkor and Mablung spend a quiet evening together, telling each other stories and talking about their past.





	Counting Stars

**Author's Note:**

> Set somewhere after Chapter Ninety-Five of Mighty Love

Mablung sat on the balcony with Melkor, a glass of wine in hand, and looked at the evening sky turning from flaming red and gold to purple and dark blue. “Let’s count stars”, Melkor suddenly said when the first stars blinked down on them. Mablung smiled at him. “What do you want to tell me?” Melkor blushed. “I’d hoped _you _would tell me more about your childhood.”

“There’s not much to tell about that. I was a normal child with a normal childhood.” Melkor smiled. “I haven’t had much opportunity to watch the normal childhood of normal elven children. But I doubt many children have their own private cave.” Mablung chuckled. “You may be right. Hm... Let me tell you how I met Damrod and Díriel. I was ten or eleven, I think.”

_Mablung had never travelled that far east, he usually stayed in the vicinity of the cave he had found last year. It was a good shelter if the weather changed and sometimes he even slept up there. He knew that his father didn’t like it, but his mother didn’t take such a narrow view as long as he did so only in the holidays. School was important to them both and Mablung knew that it would get him into bigger trouble than it was worth, if he skipped it. So he postponed his longer ramblings to the summer holidays. _

_For this time he had set it in his head to look at the sea. He was already walking the fourth day, always along the river running through the Calacirya, but not so close to the road that he would have met people. In spots the grass was as high as his head and now and then he was startling deer. Yesterday he had caught a rabbit for dinner. Father had shown him on one of his free days how to make snares and make the animal ready to eat. _

_Mablung really liked to be with his father when he had time to play with him and show him such things. But father just couldn’t understand, that he wanted to _use _the skills he was learning from him. He wondered how it would have been to live at the time of the Great Journey. Grandmother Finya had told him so much about it. He would have liked to be there, surely he would have been a good hunter. _

_Mablung sniffed when the east wind brought a strange smell to his nose. Briny and... kind of clean. At the same moment he heard laughter and stood without warning in the water of a little lake that had been hidden by the high grass. At the opposite shore the grass was flattened and two boys stood up to their hips in the lake and splashed water at each other, giggling and squealing loudly. Mablung stood motionless, not sure if he should announce himself or vanish back into the high grass. Before he could decide, they had already seen him. _

_“Hello!”, the taller boy called and waved at him, they looked so alike that they could only be related. Mablung waved shyly back. “What’s your name?” Mablung scowled. He understood him, but he was pronouncing the words in a strange way. “Mablung”, he called back. “And you?” “I’m Damrod and that’s my brother Díriel. Are you alone? Come over and play with us.” Mablung hesitated only a moment, then he pulled off his shoes and waded right through the lake. His trousers were already wet, so it didn’t matter, and the lake was nowhere deeper than his waist. _

_“Hi”, Damrod said again, when he had reached them. “Where are you from?” “Tirion. And you?” Mablung undressed and laid his clothes into the sun to dry. “Alqualonde.” They stared at him. “You’ve walked all the way from Tirion?”, Díriel asked surprised. “Alone? Isn’t that far?” Mablung shrugged. “I like to walk.” “And your parents don’t mind? If we aren’t home for dinner, we’ll get grounded.” “Mother doesn’t mind and father... well, he doesn’t want to argue with mother all the time.” And because he didn’t like to be interrogated any more, he cried: “I bet I can swim faster than you!” and sprang back into the water._

“They invited me home and I stayed for three days. We put out to sea with their father and helped him fish and when I had to go home again, we promised each other that we would write and meet again as soon as possible.” Mablung laughed softly. “I think, my parents were very surprised about how many letters I was suddenly writing. Damrod and Díriel were my best friends for years.”

“And then Glorfindel came?”, Melkor asked. “In a way, yes. But that’s not how this works”, Mablung answered sternly. “It’s your turn. Tell me about... Rivendell. Yes! When Glorfindel heard that I had come for you, he actually defended you – he thought I was angry at you, you see? It surprised me, that he tried to protect you.”

Melkor chuckled. “Silly him. Who would ever think that? But I was surprised, too, when he forgave me. The first time he came to me, he was _angry _and he shouted at me, demanding to hear what I had done to you and where you were. And I wasn’t in a state to answer him. Meldor saved me that day. But then the War of the Ring happened and... I told you how I chased away the orcs?”

Mablung nodded with a smile and kissed his cheek. “That was so brave and utterly... _good._” Melkor turned his head and gave him a proper kiss. “They were important to me, although I was afraid of them. I didn’t want them to die... I couldn’t let them fend for themselves if I could help. It surprised me that I felt that way. And Glorfindel, too.”

_Melkor lay in bed and stared at the ceiling. His back hurt when he moved, even breathing hurt. He was bored, reading was impossible in this position and he couldn’t sleep the whole day, either. He moaned softly when someone knocked at his door and he tensed as a reaction to it. “Yes?”, he said with trembling voice. _

_He knew it couldn’t be Meldor. His... friend had a special knock to announce himself – and he had told him this morning that he had a lot to do. Many elves had been injured in the fight, Melkor was glad that he had been able to prevent worse. He started to tremble violently, when Glorfindel entered the room – alone. Glorfindel, Mablung’s friend. He had been so angry at him and he hadn’t believed him that he had only wanted to help. _

_The elf stopped at the door, leaning against it and watching him without a word. Melkor desperately wished he could hear him, his face didn’t tell him anything about is emotional state. “You don’t have to look at me as if you expect me to hurt you, I won’t.” Melkor quickly lowered his eyes and heard an impatient huff. His trembling intensified, he had done something wrong and he didn’t know what. But wasn’t it enough, that he was, who he was, anyway? _

_“I didn’t mean that you shouldn’t _look _at me”, Glorfindel said. “I wanted to thank you.” For some reason his voice had turned gentle. “I trust Manwe to know what he is doing and you really changed. And I’m very grateful that you saved my friends.” He took a deep breath and Melkor waited intently for his next words. He believed him? He _was thanking _him? “If... if you know anything about Mablung’s whereabouts... you don’t even know who I’m talking about, do you?” _

_But he did. Melkor’s lips trembled, but he couldn’t bring himself to say something. “But...”, Glorfindel continued and Melkor heard the pain in his voice, “if you do... if you have an idea of where he could be... please, tell me. Or tell Meldor, if you can’t talk to me.” Melkor sobbed when tears started to run down his cheeks. He knew exactly where Mablung was, but he couldn’t say it. He couldn’t even tell Meldor – of the moment his last hope had been broken. Did Glorfindel still love Mablung? And Mablung? Had he imagined, all these nights in his arms, that it was Glorfindel who was holding him?_

Melkor coughed as his voice failed him and Mablung squeezed his hand. “It’s okay”, Melkor said with a reassuring smile. “I know now that it was different than I thought then. After that, Glorfindel was much more nice to me. He didn’t talk to me often, I think he realised that I was for some reason more afraid of him than of others, but he stopped glowering at me. I wondered... You must have been very young when Glorfindel and you were a couple. Did you...”

“Did we have sex, you mean?” Mablung led Melkor’s hand to his lips and kissed his knuckles. “Yes. I wanted it so much. Glorfindel was a little reluctant, because I was almost a child – not off age – but I persuaded him. It was...” Mablung blushed. “To be honest: It was fantastic. He was so careful not to hurt me, so intent on giving me pleasure.” He hadn’t thought about it for years. Glorfindel was still his friend, but he didn’t think about him in the way he had done in that distant past. “I hope you don’t want me to tell you that story in all detail.”

Melkor laughed. “No. It’s just... I’m glad that your first time was nice, that it didn’t happen in Angband. I know that Mo wasn’t cruel to you, but...” “You are right.” Mablung smiled at him. Melkor always was a little reluctant to talk about Angband, it was good to hear him start that topic himself.

“Mo was never brutal or cruel, but he still showed me very clearly that first time, what I was now. Afterwards, he held me until I stopped crying, but... I’m glad, too, that I’d had sex before. I knew how good it could feel. And with Mo it _was _often pleasurable – maybe not in the way I would have wished, but... I knew that he would allow me release if I pleased him and I could accept it as the way things were.” Mablung shrugged with a sheepish smile.

Melkor smiled back and kissed him again. “I always felt bad for not appreciating at first how much you wanted to please. I was so attuned to the hatred all the slaves felt for me that I couldn’t see how different you were. Those first years must have been so bad for you.” Mablung took Melkor’s hand firmly between his own.

“I won’t lie and say that it wasn’t. I wanted to please you and was always feeling that I couldn’t satisfy you. I wasn’t angry because you hurt me so much, Mo hurt me for his pleasure, too, but I thought, I wasn’t good enough because it was so hard for me to bear the pain you put me through. But – if you weren’t angry – I soon knew that you wouldn’t go too far. Very far, yes, too far for me to be aroused by it, but not... more than I could take.

You didn't beat me unconscious. You didn’t starve me, either, and that made me hope that I wasn’t doing too much wrong. I was used to not getting food when I didn’t do my work.” Mablung leaned against Melkor’s shoulder and Melkor kissed his hair. “And of course, after... you know, it was so much better.” Mablung smiled up to him. “I had almost resigned myself not to be able to please you and then you started to show me just how much I truly did. You told me, that I wasn’t easily exchangeable! Can you imagine how happy that made me?”

Melkor smiled a sad little smile. “I know. As I said, even then I felt bad for not appreciating sooner what a treasure you were.” He kissed him gently. “You make me so happy, every single day.” Mablung climbed on his lap and snuggled into him. “You make me happy, too, husband.” He nuzzled Melkor’s neck and Melkor sighed contentedly, his hands caressed Mablung’s back and thighs. He tensed, when they heard steps on the stairs, Moicáno was home.

Mablung stopped his kisses, Melkor was always a little nervous to show Moicáno that they indeed where a couple. “Hm?” Mablung cocked his head when Melkor huffed. “Oh, I just thought how ironic it is, that I have scruples to kiss you in front of the boy, when I had no scruples at all to fuck you when _you_ were still a boy.” “Please, let’s not talk about how to best calculate my age, it gives me headaches.”

Mablung grinned at him. “And besides, I just told you that Glorfindel and me couldn’t keep our hands off each other when I was much younger. Look at it this way: If we had met in another way and we had ended up having sex, would you still feel guilty about my age?” Melkor hadn’t time to answer because Moicáno entered the living room with a cheerful greeting. He grinned at them when he saw them sitting on the balcony, Mablung still in Melkor’s lap and vanished as quickly as he had come in with a: “Oh, don’t let me disturb you.”

Mablung shook with laughter. “He doesn’t seem to have any problems seeing us together like this.” Melkor smiled. “Does he really think we are going to have sex on the balcony.” Mablung shrugged his shoulders with a mischievous grin. “It’s one of the few places in the house where we didn’t have sex, yet. But I don’t want an audience, involuntary or otherwise.”

He slid off Melkor’s lap and offered him his hand with a seductive look from under his lashes. “What do you think about continuing this inside?” “It would be my pleasure.” Melkor let him pull him inside and closed the balcony doors behind them.


End file.
